Numerical modelling of Cavitation in Blood Vessel using Immersed Boundary Method

Controlled oscillation of microbubbles in a blood vessel can be used to modify the permeability of the vessel wall. This technique,called sonoporation, can potentially be used for gene therapy and targeted drug delivery for the treatment of cancer and other diseases. This project focuses on developing an Octree-based Fluid-Structure Interaction (FSI) model that simulates the interaction of an oscillating axisymmetric bubble subjected to focused ultrasound waves with the walls of a blood vessel. The model uses the Immersed Boundary Method (IBM) to simulate the interaction of viscoelastic tissue and blood plasma separated by an elastic blood vessel. It also uses an "all-Mach" formulation to simulate compressible multi-phase simulation of bubbles and blood. The multiphase flow solver, developed inside the platform Basilisk, is based on the Volume-of-Fluid method and includes surface tension and viscous forces in the formulation. The study also focuses on the understanding of the bubble-vessel interaction for varying vessel radius and vessel compliance and also on the frequency of the ultrasound waves.